Feminist Fruit Comedy Punk Band. Really happy about the sound of that till I got to Punk Band. Need not have freaked – the New Athenaeum, which is really the old Athenaeum given an enthusiastic makeover, has such delightfully amenable acoustics that the raucous ‘music’ is not the pits, even for me. And the girls’ school group in the row ahead loves it. 

Personally I am more enamoured of the characters, excellently realised by the experienced actors: Harriet Hughes as bubbly Lemon Lime Bitters, lead guitarist; Rosie Howells as hostile Peachy Keen, who also claims to be lead guitarist; and Alayne Dick as moody mystery woman Sour Grapes, the drummer they found on TradeMe. In the Property section. Their personalities are amusing and well-defined, the zestful repartee sparkles and wicked fruit puns abound.

The story is a little predictable, but entertaining, and the message is heart-warming: friends matter, trust them. Be true to yourself. Or not. Invent a cool new persona and be true to that. When not belting out impressively aggressive songs during their dress rehearsal, the Rotten Cores are desperately trying to work out their personal and group identities.

They remind me of Comic Strip’s 1980s pseudo-documentary Bad News Tour, about an amateur heavy metal band angsting over the definition of a heavy metal band, while at least one member is actually so prosaically middle class that he surreptitiously phones his mum to get his library book back in time. Similarly green-haired punk frontwoman Lemon, who is secretly longing to play her classical clarinet, comes out with an endearing musical tribute to Ethel Benjamin, NZ’s first woman lawyer, while the other two wannabe punks have embarrassing non-punk secrets as well. 

It’s a pity there are not here, as in other centres, print-outs of the songs, as from what I can glean they appear deliciously satirical – one song is entitled ‘I don’t want to be gluten-free’, and I do catch the cheeky last line! I have a taste for literary scripts and hence appreciate the surprising vocabulary, pertinent dialogue and pithy come-backs. Amidst the cut and thrust of their vicious punk group politics, I relish acerbic utterances like, “We have dangerously different definitions of horrendously rude.”

I won’t risk incurring spoiler alerts with more quotes from the script, but prospective punters can get an excellent sample of Discharge’s style, and the fabulous Rotten cast, from the gorgeous tongue-in-cheek video on Facebook, Discharge Presents the Rotten Cores Make-up Tutorial. It really acquaints you with the characters, from Lemon’s perky assertion that the perfect number of make-up brushes is 27 (45 minutes to one hour, per eye) to Peachy’s belligerent retort, “You have ten pre-heated make-up brushes attached to your f*cking hands!” Meanwhile Sour Grapes (“It’s the name my parents gave me! Be respectful!’) deadpans, “My eyeliner is heavy. Like the pressures of living in this world.”

The venue is a great fit for Rotten to the Core, a black box that is naturally a credible rehearsal space, with the gleaming drum kit on a platform decorated with posters and record covers of Patti Smith, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Blondie – even Pussy Riot. I’m smug when I spot a poster for The Runaways – dammit, I’d thought one of the numbers sounded a bit like I’m your Cherry Bomb! When the musical numbers are pumping, lighting effects transport us to the excitement of live gigs and the little theatre really rocks to the sound. Slightly embarrassed to find I’m bouncing in my seat. What a joy to have Discharge, our much-valued genuine feminist comedy troupe, back where they began in Dunedin, juicier than ever.

If you are too sophisticated for puns or cannot remember when you thought, “Why was the tomato red?” “Because he saw the salad dressing!” was hilarious, please, oh please stop, before I finish by urging even those more raisin than grape not to miss this berry funny and appeeling (sic) show! 

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer

For the first time as a Fringe show reviewer, sitting on a very uncomfortable seat in Flux, Wellington Museum’s performance space, I think “I’m too old to be here.”

It’s not just because of the chair. On the way in, I have run into a bunch of schoolboys clutching notepaper – they’re tasked with commenting on their theatrical experience. And once inside, meandering through the bowels of the museum, I’m considering rather uneasily the title of tonight’s show. 

The performing group Discharge originated in Dunedin and has been active in Wellington for about four years. ‘The Rotten Cores’ is a punk band and a girls’ punk band at that.

My first impression of musicians Harriet Hughes, Alayne Dick and Rosie Howells does nothing to mitigate my initial discomfort. Lemon Lime Bitters, Sour Grapes and Peachy Keen launch into their first number. “Raucous, even cacophonous,” I scribble down. “Inaudible.”  

But perhaps that’s all part of the deal, as observed by one of the trio who comments to the drummer, “I don’t know where you got the idea that volume trumps diction.”

The enthusiasm of the guy next to me is palpable. By the third number, I think I catch the words “I want to be gluten free”. And the drumming with its driving quality is becoming hypnotic. I’m in the zone.

Something very special happens halfway through the show. We’ve heard half a dozen numbers, some delightful repartee, and a tribute to New Zealand’s first female lawyer, Ethel Benjamin, a woman “who broke all the rules in order to enforce them.”

Now we get an argument and a walkout by one, then another of the trio, and an abandoned drummer, who gets up, and produces of all things – well, no spoiler! Sufficient to say that we now get something unexpected: character development! We hear some quite touching interaction amongst our tough punk musicians. The crowning comment has got to be: “I didn’t know that you knew what you were like.”

I wonder if these three know what they’re like. Post-show jubilation is justified. Just in case they don’t know what they’re like, they can rest easy. Discharge are charged! And they’re going places. The schoolboys agree with me.

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer